Rules governing doorstep charity collectors

gibson123

Only two charity collectors get my time at the doorstep, Santa's elves (our local Rotarians) who give out sweets to the kids, have santa wave to them from his sleigh and take donations and the Salvation Army. i give through GAYE and I make it perfectly clear that i give enough.

zagfles

beccavaliant wrote: »

not in the slightest when we get them ongoing support that number rapidly shrinks every month where admin fees on a one off online donation never shrink, and your calculation of it to be 25% is wrong that would be three times their outlay back not four.

No it wouldn't. Either your maths is wrong or you've explained it wrong. You said you get them 4x their expenses back. That means if they pay you £1000, you will get them £4000 back. So their net gain is £3000, the £4000 donated minus the £1000 expenses. So you take 25%, £1000 of the £4000 donated.

If you meant you get them 4x back plus their expenses back, you should have said that. And that's still 20% anyway, much higher than the other methods I mentioned.

Also, should a chugger convince someone that the charity is a worthy cause, it would be much better for the charity if rather than signing a DD with the chugger, the punter goes home and makes an online donation. Because then the donation will not count towards the chugger's targets (as they can't possibly know whether the punter did in fact donate) and so will be in addition to what the chugger has to raise!

So if the chugger is targeted with raising £4000, why be part of that £4000 when your donation could be in addition to it! If you donate £100 via the chugger, the chugger has to raise a further £3900, charity get £4000 total. If you donate £100 online the chugger still has to raise £4000 so the charity gets £4100!

So think about that if a chugger convinces you to donate to a charity!

j.e.j.

stir_crazy wrote: »

I printed one of these off and only had one knocker once I stuck it on the door. When I told him to read the sign he replied " I already did, don't worry I'm not trying to sell you something!" Yes, but charity workers are included on it!

Charity workers are included on the sign, but the law doesn't apply to them, so they're not breaking the law by ignoring the sign, whereas traders are, if that makes sense. To quote from MSE:

What to do if they keep knocking

It may be a criminal offence for traders (not charities/religious groups) to ignore cold calling signs under the regulations on our sign.

Lavendyr

We seem to get a lot of charity collectors at our doorstep since we moved house. Hubby is very patient with them - I am less so! We both give to a number of chosen charities through GAYE and would not therefore donate on the doorstep.

I just think it is such an outdated and unpleasant way to try and raise money. It must still work otherwise charities wouldn't do it - but it doesn't work for us.

prowla

j.e.j. wrote: »

Charity workers are included on the sign, but the law doesn't apply to them, so they're not breaking the law by ignoring the sign, whereas traders are, if that makes sense. To quote from MSE: ...

Sure, but what the heck does a charity think they could possibly gain by ignoring a sign that plainly asks them not to?

Morals_champion

There has been an increasing number of doorstep charity collectors or so called chuggers / churglers at my house - I called the council and they advised me that for door-to-door collections the charity should request a permit from the Local Council under the House to House Collections Act 1939 unless they have a national exemption granted by the Home Office in which case they are required only to notify the Local Council when they intend to make door-to-door collections. I live in a fairly small town and there are on average 20 charities who are collecting each month - so I can look forward to 4-5 cold calls a week.

I have got a 'no cold callers' sign on my door but this does not seem to deter the charity collectors whose usual response is 'we weren't sure that it applied to us'. I do find the response rather disingenuous but it does seem to reflect the best practice guidance provided by the PFRA - the charities self-regulating body for doorstep charity collections. A link to the rules their members are required to adhere to for doorstep collection is available on their website. There is a penalty points system if the rules are ignored so I would suggest that PFRA may be a good starting point for addressing complaints regarding doorstep charity collectors.

Also quite interesting is how the PFRA is funded. They seem to get 75 pence for each donor signed up at a doorstep. Their website states;

However, the bulk of PFRA funding comes through a per capita levy paid by our user members. Charity members of the PFRA contribute 75p for each donor they recruit through F2F fundraising. This ensures that the vast majority of our income is paid by charities out of donated income and not by fundraising agencies, which helps to ensure that we are a charity-led organisation.


I once had the same doorstep charity collector cold call twice on the same night - the second time to tell me that 'all' my neighbours had donated, something I later found to be untrue. I think this may stray into the 'aggressive practices' provisions of the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008. I guess this may depend how they are engaged by the charity / agency - if they are self-employed my view is that they would meet the definition of a trader - an extract from the legislation below so that you can form your own view.

Aggressive commercial practices
7.—(1) A commercial practice is aggressive if, in its factual context, taking account of all of its
features and circumstances—
(a) it significantly impairs or is likely significantly to impair the average consumer’s freedom of choice or conduct in relation to the product concerned through the use of harassment, coercion or undue influence; and
(b) it thereby causes or is likely to cause him to take a transactional decision he would not have taken otherwise.
(2) In determining whether a commercial practice uses harassment, coercion or undue influence account shall be taken of—
(a) its timing, location, nature or persistence;
(b) the use of threatening or abusive language or behaviour;
(c) the exploitation by the trader of any specific misfortune or circumstance of such gravity as to impair the consumer’s judgment, of which the trader is aware, to influence the consumer’s decision with regard to the product;
(d) any onerous or disproportionate non-contractual barrier imposed by the trader where a consumer wishes to exercise rights under the contract, including rights to terminate a contract or to switch to another product or another trader; and
(e) any threat to take any action which cannot legally be taken.
(3) In this regulation—
(a) “coercion” includes the use of physical force; and
(b) “undue influence” means exploiting a position of power in relation to the consumer so as to apply pressure, even without using or threatening to use physical force, in a way which significantly limits the consumer’s ability to make an informed decision.

Better_Days

I had someone from the RSPCA knock on my door yesterday. He saw that I had a dog, said that cruelty cases had gone up by 30% and was sure he could rely on me to donate towards a kennel for a dog. He could also assure me the money wouldn't be spent on admin.

I really do dislike these sort of tactics.

My health is poor and it is a real pain to get out of bed and to tell them to go away.

Mind you at least they went away, unlike the bloomin' JoHo's who repeatedly came to our previous house. In the end I got really cross and told them to never darken my door again. That did work, but it shouldn't have had to come to that.

GobbledyGook

We got people at the door constantly. After 12 different collectors/sellers/religious parties in one day I made up a sign which was the same as MSE's and also asked, politely, for no charity collectors either as I already donate to those I wish to.

polgara

We just say that we don't do business of any kind on the doorstep - they can leave a leaflet and we will research it in our own time

Georgiegirl256

Better_Days wrote: »

I had someone from the RSPCA knock on my door yesterday. He saw that I had a dog, said that cruelty cases had gone up by 30% and was sure he could rely on me to donate towards a kennel for a dog. He could also assure me the money wouldn't be spent on admin.

We had one round the other day from the RSPCA. Hubby's response was to thrust the cat at him and say "here's a donation for you, you can have him back" I :rotfl: and the guy was like :eek:

Once he's composed himself, he then played on the fact that we'd got a cat from the RSPCA, so we must want to donate no? The sickly sweet overly nice persona soon disappeared once I'd made it clear that we didn't want to sign up to a monthly direct debit.